Portland primed to get hip-hop high school

Olivia Bucks/The OregonianMaria Velador, 11, a sixth-grader at Harvey Scott Elementary School in Portland, works on the "baby freeze" during the school's after-school hip-hop and break-dancing class. Instructor Levi Banner, who also teaches graffiti art in Portland, said the art forms give kids a way to express themselves and engage with others in a positive way.
Take "Fame," set it to a hip-hop beat and you have what could become Portland's newest public high school.

The High School for Recording Arts Portland is working to win the right to open its doors next fall with the backing of Portland Public Schools.

Organizers include some of the area's top hip-hop artists such as Vursatyl of the group Lifesavas and Cool Nutz. They envision a public charter school where students could explore hip-hop music and dance, delve into hip-hop culture and graduate with a high school diploma, prepared for college and possibly a recording contract.

"Kids are dropping out or not finishing school," Vursatyl said. "We're at a point where we need to find as many things as we can that are incentives for kids to be in school. Music sets the stage."

And while they're modeling their program after a 12-year-old hip-hop school in Minnesota, they acknowledge that they must address skepticism about how a school celebrating popular music can offer and maintain a rigorous academic program.

Coming up

Monday: The Portland School Board's Charter School Committee will hold a two-hour public hearing at 4 p.m. on the High School for Recording Arts Portland at the district administration building, 501 N. Dixon St.

What's next: A recommendation from Superintendent Carole Smith will follow later and the seven-member school board will likely vote in late November.

That question is also at the top of the list for Portland School Board members. District evaluators have reviewed the school's application and recommended approval -- pending answers to nearly 50 follow-up questions requesting more information about the budget, accountability, education standards and demand for the school.

Board members also have asked for more information about a potential sister school in Los Angeles that closed because of a contract mix-up and a sister school in New York that's still trying to raise enough money to open its doors.

Nearly a dozen local artists, community members and educators are part of the development team for the Portland school. They've made the case to the school district that in a city of indie music, the vibrant hip-hop scene is a natural way to draw in teenagers of all races.

School clubs already feature break dancing and hip-hop dance. Kids create the trademark staccato rhymes and beats in school hallways and on front porches. They cut hip-hop fashion statements along the halls of Lloyd Center with oversized sunglasses, stiff-brimmed baseball caps and throwback jerseys.

The area already has examples of targeted career curricula, from health occupations and construction at Benson High School to arts programs in Beaverton and Portland's Renaissance Arts Academy.

Minnesota model

Hip-hop is to some kids what woodshop or art classes are for other kids, said Tony Simmons, the development director at the High School for Recording Arts Minnesota in St. Paul.

"One size doesn't fit all when it comes to young people," Simmons said. "Young people have changed. They see music differently now. They want to own it. Older people were consumers. Music was something we sought out, purchased, experienced. Young people see themselves as people who want to create."

The local school plans to follow the Minnesota school's lead. The St. Paul program is also a public charter school and offers classes including algebra, audio engineering, poetry, PE, business of music, science and the history of jazz. Its nontraditional courses are required to include elements that help students learn skills that are part of state education standards.

The Minnesota school also has a student recording studio that has secured contracts from companies such as State Farm and Verizon to create CDs, videos and commercials, often on teen themes such as staying in school.

Parent Erica Jayasuriya is the spark behind the Portland school's development. A Waldorf-trained teacher, Jayasuriya said the idea for the school grew from conversations with her son, Kahlil.

The 13-year-old is a drummer and wanted an atmosphere to work on his music in a challenging and culturally diverse academic environment.

Integrating the studies

The school aims to serve about 200 kids. Part of the school's program will focus on recording arts such as dance, spoken word or rap, but students also will take algebra, world history and biology, Jayasuriya said.

The key is to integrate the studies and meet Oregon high school standards, said Jason Petty, a teacher and hip-hop artist who is helping develop the curriculum.

For example, all students at the school would likely take

View full sizeOlivia Bucks/The OregonianThe after-school break-dancing class, led by instructor Levi Banner, (left) practices a "hip-hop walk" as students prepare for some freestyle break dancing. Banner is part of the Zulu Nation, a grass-roots organization that works in the Portland community. Many in the group teach dance and mentor at Portland schools.a course about how sound is transmitted between people. The course might start with an investigation of the iPod, its technology and physics. The class may also include an examination of the phonograph, headphones, acoustics and even a lesson on the anatomy of the human ear and how it works.

Combining hip-hop with academics isn't new. The Hiphop Archive at Harvard University and New York University's Hip-Hop and Pedagogy Initiative both foster hip-hop research.

In Los Angeles, teacher and hip-hop artist Sebastien Elkouby is part of an effort to create a national hip-hop education curriculum. He's now teaching a yearlong Global Awareness Through Hip Hop course to middle-school students.

"Parents at first thought the class would be a waste of time, but they quickly realize their kids learned about social issues and developed writing skills and geography skills," Elkouby said. "The kids were shocked, too. They think they're there to just dance. It's a class. There is homework and essays."

Molalla High School student and rapper Peter Horace, also known as ArionB, helped record a song for the Portland charter school's hearing before the school board Monday. A senior this year, Horace won't be able to take advantage of the school if it's approved.

But he said he would have liked to be in an environment like that.

"I've probably made 50 or so songs already," he said. "There's just a lot of people interested in this. In a city like Portland, there are probably as many white kids doing it as black kids. It beats every stereotype."